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Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao today pitched for tax incentives to fast-growing states and stressed on transfer of various subjects from the Centre to the states.
In his remarks at the fourth meeting of the Niti Aayog Governing Council in New Delhi, Rao, also sought “removal of rigidness” of certain centrally-sponsored schemes that curtail the initiatives of the state government.
According to an official release here, Rao, who shared at the meeting some of the initiatives taken up by his government said, “I would like to mention that the growth of India lies in the growth of its states. Therefore the fast-growing states must be encouraged by tax incentives, if not by additional transfers from central funds.”
“Further, we need to focus on agriculture and allied activities as an integrated sector and dairy, poultry, goat and sheep rearing, and fisheries should also be exempted from income tax,” he said.
As a part of the initiatives for doubling the income of farmers, MGNREGA funds should be tagged to agriculture with 50 per cent contribution from farmers to reduce the cost of their investment, Rao said.
“I would like to say that the country is facing lots of challenges in the areas of external affairs, defence and macro-economic and global issues,” he said.
Therefore in the changing global scenario, it should continue to give due attention to those issues, he added.
At the same time, it should leave more space to the states in doing work in such sectors as health, education, urban development, agriculture and rural development and remove the rigidness of certain centrally-sponsored schemes that curtail initiatives of the state government, the release quoted Rao as saying.
The TRS chief, who has proposed forging a non-Congress, non-BJP coalition in national politics, ‘Federal Front’ comprising various regional parties, had earlier favoured transfer of various subjects from the Centre to the states as against centralisation of powers.
The chief minister wanted to know why departments like health, agriculture, rural development, urban development should remain with the Centre as he had said that the “Centre is involving in matters that can be taken care of by the state.”
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